The Assyrian Tragedy
The Mandates had earlier promised the League of Nations a just
solution to the Assyrian question. Instead, they turned it into a
tragedy. The League of Nations stopped monitoring the exodus of
Assyrians. The Assyrians lost their representation in the League and
international community. The British and French intelligentsia
through their Ministry of Foreign Affairs represented the Assyrians
and minority groups at the League Council. The Assyrians were
classified as a minority and became known separately as Asouri,
Ashouri, Athouri, Suraya, Suroyo, Syriani, Nestori, Chaldean,
Jacobite and Arabi-Masihi (Arab Christian). The Assyrian people were
decimated. They were divided into separate denominational groups and
given different sectarian names. They were alienated from one
another in a bid to minimize and understate the total count of the
Assyrian population and lessen their political weight when the small
figure was presented to the League Council. It has since been known,
in several political circles, as the Assyrian tragedy.
Let the United Nations look at the deplorable state of the Assyrians
now. Over 60% of its total population has been dispersed or forcibly
evicted from their original dwellings and live in Diaspora. The
United Nations still declines to reclassify the stricken Assyrians
as displaced refugees. To restore to the Assyrian his original
Assyrian identity, he would be classified as genuine refugee,
entitled to, at least, his basic human rights through the UN and
other international organizations and humanitarian agencies. The
Assyrians since they lost their right of appeal to the defunct
League of Nations as a homeless and abandoned people, the League
Council classified them as subjects of the Islamic states of the
Abode of Peace. The Assyrians are described as naturalized citizens
of existing Islamic states. Their racial recognition as Assyrian in
nationality has been officially nullified. World body defines the
Assyrian as a naturalized subject of the state in which he happened
to be at the time of creating Arab-Islamic states. By doing so, The
West has since disengaged itself from any further responsibility
towards the “Assyrian” so-called locals. To the world, Assyrians do
not exist. Assyrians seeking assistance from the UN agencies are
consistently referred to the Kordish offices in the north of Iraq.
Otherwise, they are treated as locals. In the circumstances, the
chance of making headway is 1 to 30.
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